Preservice Teachers Having Meaningful Mathematical Dialogues With Latina Mothers

• In Event: Foregrounding Cultural Ways of Being in Mathematics Teacher Education: Cases From Latinx and Pāsifika Communities

Abstract

Purpose. This paper is part of a larger project aimed at promoting and supporting family engagement in mathematics for low-income, culturally and linguistically diverse families whose children are primarily emergent bilinguals. This purpose of this study is to report on the specific findings associated with preservice teachers’ (PST) experiences of engaging with Latina mothers to create a lesson that focused on the mathematics that occurred in their students’ communities.

Theoretical Framework. It is important that PSTs have the opportunity during their teacher preparation program to learn about the experiences of the students they may teach and to incorporate this knowledge in their mathematics lessons (Author, 2007; Kitchen, 2005). The more PSTs learn about and from their students and their families, the more PSTs can also learn how to help children understand mathematics with respect to the way they use mathematics in their lives (Wager, 2012). Yet, there is evidence that while it is crucial for making connections between mathematics instruction and children’s lived experiences, it is a particularly challenging task for new teachers (Author, 2016).

Methods and Data Sources. The participants were twelve women (five Latina, four White, three Asian) elementary PSTs. As part of a mathematics methods project, the PSTs worked in small groups to create a community based mathematics lesson that centered on what they learned from their conversations with six primarily Spanish speaking Latina mothers from a pre-kindergarten – second grade dual language school community. The data sources include a focus group interview with the PSTs and the mothers, feedback from the mothers on the PSTs’ final project presentations, and the PSTs individual reflections of the assignment.
An iterative analysis (Bogdan & Biklen, 2006) was conducted to demarcate and identify key words and phrases across the participants’ reflections. A thematic development of the narratives followed by utilizing an emergent coding scheme (Marshall & Rossman, 2006) to organize and sort the reflections. The key patterns across participants’ responses were then summarized.

Results. The PSTs spoke of the importance of developing rapport with the parents of their students. One PST shared how the conversations with the mothers helped her to think about the importance of building bridges between home and school mathematics. PSTs also reported that they learned to minimize assumptions they may have about their students’ families. For example, after learning that one of the mothers was from El Salvador one PST stated, “Though I am a Latina myself and find a great deal of similarities with the [school] community, I forgot how diverse the Latino community can be.” Other themes that emerged from the study include specifics matter, parents’ points of view, and above and beyond.

Significance. The findings suggest that providing opportunities for PSTs to learn from parents where they spend time with their children in their communities can help PSTs recognize the importance of making these connections in their mathematics teaching. This is key to consider as a means to promote student learning.

Author

• Kathleen Jablon Stoehr, Santa Clara University